Alpine, the Renault subsidiary that produced sports cars under its own name until the 1970s and as Renaults into the mid-1990s, has been working on a comeback. Last year we saw a concept precursor, and now we get our first look at the real thing: the mid-engined A110 sports car.

The A110 resurrects the name of Alpine’s most famous model, a rear-engined sports car produced from the early 1960s to the mid ’70s that achieved considerable notoriety for its success in rally racing, including winning the World Rally Championship in 1973.

The two-seat sports car uses an aluminum-intensive architecture and is powered by a newly developed turbocharged 1.8-liter inline-four making 248 horsepower and 236 lb-ft of torque. The output is shunted through a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic transmission sourced from Getrag, and the claimed base curb weight is in the neighborhood of 2400 pounds. Alpine claims acceleration from zero to 62 mph in 4.5 seconds and an electronically limited top speed of 155 mph.

The A110 is 164.5 inches long, 70.8 inches wide, and 49.3 inches high, making it slightly shorter, wider, and lower than a Subaru BRZ. Three chassis modes are available for the driver to choose—Normal, Sport, and Track—all of which affect the usual stuff: throttle response, transmission behavior, stability-control intervention, exhaust sound, and the information displayed in the gauge cluster.

A Première Edition will be offered in a run of 1955 examples—1955 being the year that Alpine was launched—in a choice of blue, black, or white and fitted with a bevy of equipment that includes 18-inch Fuchs wheels in a unique finish, carbon-fiber interior trim, brushed-aluminum pedals, leather upholstery for the one-piece Sabelt sport seats, French Tricolore flag–themed badging, and a numbered plaque inside.

Although the French automaker has not sold cars in the United States since the days of the Renault Medallion in the late 1980s, there is a possibility that the A110 could find its way here, perhaps sold by Infiniti dealers. If so, it would compete against the Porsche 718 Cayman and the Alfa Romeo 4C—making even the Alfa seem like a mainstream choice by comparison.